LIHU'E, Kaua'i — As many as a quarter of Wilcox Memorial Hospital's pre-strike nursing staff may not return to work there if nurses ratify their new contract, as they are expected to do.

Nurses voted until 9 p.m. yesterday on the contract to end their four-month strike. The strike results were to be released today. The Hawai'i Nurses Association and the hospital both said they expected a strong vote in favor of the settlement.

But for many nurses, employment at Wilcox Hospital is over. Emergency Room nurse D.Q. Jackson elected to resign. He is 62 and said he decided during the strike that he wants to move on to other things than nursing.

"We know of quite a few resignations and retirements," he said.

As the voting went on yesterday, the nurses' union was tracking how many of its members actually intended to return to work. Of the 140 pre-strike nurses, 12 licensed practical nurses will not be invited back. The hospital has decided to replace its LPN positions with registered nurses, and the union negotiated an improved severance plan for its LPN members, Jackson said.

Another dozen nurses have taken jobs elsewhere. And there may be as many as a dozen more nurses who, Jackson said, "have drifted away and moved on to other endeavors, and we just don't know about them."

Twenty-five nurses had crossed the picket lines by the end of the strike, but 115 nurses, or 82 percent of the hospital's nursing staff, stayed away throughout the strike.

Medical/surgical nurse Esther Tunac, a 13-year veteran at the hospital, said she considered resigning from the hospital, simply because she anticipates it may be difficult to work with managers who sat across the negotiation table. But she said it likely would have meant moving to O'ahu to find work, and she was unwilling to leave her Kealia home.

Most contract details were to be released later, but union officials said the hospital made concessions in the final days of negotiation on the nurses' key issue: the development of a clear system to bring in additional nursing staff when patient care is heavier than normal.

"A lot of people never understood that this strike was not about money. We were making a stand. We don't want to be walked all over. You give me seven or eight patients, and that's too much," Tunac said. She said nurses remain wary, but she is willing to work on the matter with the hospital.

Nurses at the settlement vote yesterday, held in the Hawai'i Government Employees Union building in Lihu'e, said one of the most heartening things about the strike was the level of support they received from the community.

"People and organizations were dropping off food and cases of water. Our strike headquarters has so much food — I think we all gained weight," said Liza Desmond, a seven-year Wilcox veteran and the single mother of a 17-year-old son.

Desmond said she worked full time at a lower-paying nursing job during the strike to make ends meet, and said there's no extra cash for the upcoming holidays: "There is no Christmas. We already know that," she said.

Nurse Sandi Niitani said she was fortunate to be single, to have saved money in anticipation of the strike and to have good family support on the island, but she said the strike was tougher for other nurses, particularly those with small children at home.

If the contract is approved by nurses, they will return to work Nov. 2 and 3 to do paperwork and complete any required training and testing, before starting regular shifts, said Lani Yukimura, who has been the hospital's spokeswoman during the strike.

"We will be welcoming those nurses back and we will be moving forward," Yukimura said.

Reach Jan TenBruggencate at jant@honoluluadvertiser.com.